Corey Taylor feels that working on new Slipknot material without Paul Gray is like a football team missing one of its star players.
The frontman says it breaks his heart to think of the late bassist – and adds that the band is trying to figure out how to “fill the vacuum” left behind.
Gray died in an Iowa hotel room 2010, with an autopsy revealing drugs in his system and signs of heart disease.
Taylor tells Ultimate Guitar: “Nothing’s ever going to be the same. It’s a better way to say it, to be honest. But all we can do is what we do. The way I’ve had to look at it is: not every great football team stays together – and not every great band can keep doing it with the same people.
“It’s the nice way of me saying that I can’t just look at him as dead, which breaks my heart. I have to look at as, ‘One of our most important pieces is gone… how do we make up for that?’ It’s basically us pooling our talents to fill in this vacuum that has been left.”
Last year Slipknot fired drummer Joey Jordison, with a replacement yet to be named. Taylor will not be drawn on that subject, saying only that he is legally unable to discuss it.
Gray’s widow Brenna last month told a court that she’d asked his colleagues to help him in his fight against addiction days before he died – but that they refused.
Meanwhile, he’s also recalled recording sessions for the band’s debut album – saying he can’t forget how often he threw up in the studio due to the smell coming from an animal carcass.
He says: “You want to talk about one of the grossest moments ever? We were making our album and the band Amen – one of my favourite bands of all time – were wrapping up their album.
“Me and Casey Chaos are sharing a vocal booth; we’re not in there at the same time, but we’re in there. I’m throwing up and he’s cutting himself. And there’s this dead mouse in the boards that we couldn’t find.”
